Shop closed and ready for 2013 now

Well after several cold evenings out in the shed, the last few items were finished and posted in the Etsy and folksy shops.  The photos do make it look much colder but usually when the heating got going it became warm enough to take the hat off.

 

On the bench are some glass borders painted with black glass paint waiting for the patterns to be scratched on before firing.  Some foiling and leading and the end results are as seen below.  

It has been a great couple of months in the run up to Christmas with the opportunity to meet some customers face to face at a craft fair in Watford as well as getting some sales and great feedback. 2012 has been an interesting year so time to get the sketchbook out and work on even more new ideas.

Christmas making and first fair

It has been a very busy making time this last few weeks culminating in my first craft fair at the Colosseum in Watford.  Many thanks to Carolyn of Aspen Stained Glass for inviting me to share a pitch.  It was certainly a real treat to actually meet people, talk about my work and answer queries about the way in which things were made. 

Lots of people asked about these blue and white decorations, it was so positive to see that while I really enjoy making them, customers liked them too and were interested in how they were made.

Lots of interest again in the painted panels with lots of people asking to see the new singing bird panel.  It is still available at the moment since lots of people wanted it for themselves but were supposed to be Christmas shopping to buy for other people.

Hopefully, I will be planning to attend some more fairs in 2013 but for now, I'm happy to have got some feedback and some time to think of some more new designs.

Refreshing the RedHenGlass website

Well, it's that time of year when I take some time away from making and try to remember just how to edit and upload some new pages and images for my website www.redhenglass.co.uk Feeling inspired, I played around with matching the page backgrounds to the glass images and while this was a lot of fun, you might agree that it is all a bit too bright and difficult to read. Do please let me know if you think otherwise, but have to say, while it was enjoyable, I may return to something a little more sober even if it is to make the pictures show up more strongly. But for perhaps a limited period only, here is the rather bright website.

Autumn Trees and Singing Birds

That’s the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture! 

(Robert Browning extract from Home thoughts from abroad)

So the air has subtly changed, although the sun has shone warmly over the last couple of days, the stars are very crisp and bright at night.  There is a slight chill in the evening and on a very early train journey to Birmingham the other morning, I watched the fields around Northamptonshire and all the way to Coventry softened by mist as a low golden light lifted over the newly harvested fields.  The swallows have gathered on the telephone wires chattering about their miraculous journey that many have already thrown themselves into.

I have posted some pictures of these new pieces before, there is one hanging in my shed ready for a new home. The colours seemed to capture the season and late afternoon light and I couldn't help taking some more photos and including a couple of variations of the design.

Hertfordshire visual arts open studios

Living in Hertfordshire has many advantages but each year an excellent opportunity comes along to get along and visit many skilled artists as they open their studios to visitors across the whole of Hertfordshire.  I am a member of the HVA (Herts Visual Arts) group myself although my shed doesn't really allow for visitors but thought that I would post the link to the site so that other people might take up the opportunity to see people at work.  There is a hard copy brochure available but since it is almost September now, you can find opening times and locations online.

http://www.hvaf.org.uk/Open-Studios/Open-Studios-2012

Seaside panel is on its way to my customer

This panel began many months ago.   I had been asked if I could create a sense of the seaside with sand, starfish and rockpools.  Rather than using just flat pieces of glass, beautiful as it is, I wanted to create some depth and texture by creating some fused glass pebbles which I wanted to place in the centre to create the rockpool.

The starfish was formed with brass wire then filled with a coral coloured glass powder. The mussel shell is an extremely dark purple that doesn't really show in the photo but it is covered with a layer of iridescent glass that gives it a real pearly finish. 

So with all the experimenting, fusing and emailing, it has taken some time to reach a design and get the panel finally finished. I really enjoyed making the piece and am pleased that it is now on its way to meet the kind lady that commissioned it. 

Singing Bird in a tree

This is a new design that I have been working on based on a singing thrush in a rather fantastic looking tree with giant leaves. I'm very fond of blackwork embroidery as well as patchwork and woodcuts so this piece has influences from all of those sources.  Lots of colours were tried for the surrounding borders but the browns and greens are still my favourites. 

There are so many poems about Thrushes but this is one of my favourites.

The Thrush's Nest

Within a thick and spreading hawthorn bush

That overhung a molehill large and round,

I heard from morn to morn a merry thrush

Sing hymns to sunrise, and I drank the sound

With joy; and often, an intruding guest,

I watched her secret toil from day to day - 

How true she warped the moss to form a nest,

And modelled it within with wood and clay;

And by and by, like heath-bells gilt with dew,

There lay her shining eggs, as bright as flowers,

Ink-spotted over shells of greeny blue;

And there I witnessed, in the sunny hours,

A brood of nature's minstrels chirp and fly,

Glad as the sunshine and the laughing sky. 

John Clare

Glass course in Bristol with Chris Ainslie

Something I'm always keen to do, despite having made items for quite some time now, is to spend  some hours attending courses with other people to add to my glass working skills.  It's all very pleasant working in my shed at the bottom of the garden with the cat for company but sometimes there is nothing like meeting new people and being in a workshop somewhere else exploring  new ideas and learning something new.

The end of July saw me on a train out of London and taking a whole weekend out in Bristol at the Creative Glass Guild exploring a workshop led by the interesting and encouraging Chris Ainslie.  While Chris's web site lists him as an engraver, which he certainly does excellently,  his interest in painting glass using enamels, silver stain and the usual glass paint is another of his areas of accomplishment that were explored over the two day sessions.  There are pictures that I need to post of the experiments carried out when I have had the opportunity to get them leaded and photographed but I am keen to share the information before August quickly turns into September.  I haven't said much about the techniques since it seems only fair that anyone interested should have a look at the courses for themselves.

What can I say, plenty of materials, everything ready, useful notes, a great pace so that we covered lots of techniques, freedom to explore and all held in a terrific clean and well equipped workshop surrounded by inspiring work from other artists.  The staff were friendly, we were supplied with copious amounts of tea and biscuits and I left with a real sense of achievement looking forward to revisiting some of my own painted work using the techniques covered in the workshop.

Of all the places to be and forget my camera.  Bristol looked fantastic with some of the first sun for at least three weeks.  Although travelling alone, there was a welcoming B&B The Greenhouse, (you get a discount if you are doing a glass course) some great places to eat The Souk Kitchen a long walk around the waterside area and the Olympic opening ceremony on the TV.  What more could be required?

Bury St Edmunds Cathedral

IMGP9318_BStECathedralGlass2, a photo by Ajay Jayne on Flickr.

Waiting for the rock music at Abbeyfest to start a few weeks back (Mid July) and since this was my first visit to Bury St Edmunds I decided to take a wander around town and just take a quick tour of the Cathedral to see f there was any glass that was of interest. The Victorian creation window just inside the main entrance was charming and I can imagine children coming to the services spending quite a lot of time trying to spot the different animals shown in the window. (I certainly did ;-) )

One panel of the creation window

Some new stock

IMGP9121_redyellowhenweb, a photo by Ajay Jayne on Flickr.

I have finally had some free time to make more stock pieces for my Folksy shop. The sun has been shining brilliantly making it possible to get some decent photographs that show the colours properly and I have tried out some new borders for these new items. There are just a couple more to solder and assemble then I will make some time for the pebble and seaside ideas that I am keen to get working on.

My original red hen that was used to create the logo has now been sold so the one above is her replacement with a flowery border and darker more detailed wings.

A couple more cats are being added, one with a very dark wine red border decorated with little hearts and another with a background of flowers.

Feel free to visit the shop http://folksy.com/shops/Redhenglass

A lovely commission for March

I was delighted to hear from a friend over in East Anglia who asked if I would be able to make a piece celebrating their creatures for his Wife's birthday.  Her birthday, coincidentally, was exactly the same day as mine so everything was boding well.

The panel featuring both of their beloved cats and one out of the three of their pet chickens has now wended it's way to the Fens and the double pleasure was that they collected it personally and I got to see them both.

Temporarily out of action

Normal service will be resumed very soon now.....

P1070024_edited-1, a photo by Ajay Jayne on Flickr.

At long last it has become possible to get to proper grips with a pencil and glass cutter again after a minor mishap involving me punching the Alps. They are large, hard and unforgiving and I am celebrating not actually having broken anything.

Although it is cold and rather grey in Watford at the moment I am working on some designs that capture aspects of the seaside. A small panel featuring a Cornish landscape with a large St Ives "steal your chips" Herring Gull has surfaced from the kiln and is now waiting for me to foil, solder and assemble over the weekend.

Designs involving rock pools and the stunning Cornish coastline are also coming together with the lighter evenings and mornings encouraging me to mend even faster and get plenty of the designs translated into glass.

A picture of the rocks and waterline at the bottom of Trebah Gardens to keep me focused.